Harvest drags on into February in Victoria's Western District

Not since the 2010-11 floods was there such a large area of unharvested crop as the year ticked over into February.

Constant bouts of wet weather, combined with cool conditions in between that did not allow crop to dry out quickly, has meant there is a small, but substantial amount of crop to still come in through areas as far north as Tatyoon and Willaura.

While areas south of Hamilton normally wear the mantle as the state's latest to finish harvest this year there is more unharvested crop in the central and northern Western District around Lake Bolac at a time of year where their counterparts in NSW and Queensland are beginning to consider planting an early winter grazing crop, such as oats, should there be suitable rain event.

This is due to heavier rain, with up to 200mm falling in isolated areas to the west of Willaura in early January and widespread falls of over 50mm.

Just as farmers were getting back into it there was follow up rain last week of up to 50mm in many areas as the La Nina rains summer croppers in northern Australia were looking for instead pushed south.

Andrew Byron, Willaura, said he was still harvesting wheat at Rossbridge, between Lake Bolac and Ararat, and added he did not feel he would be finished any time soon.

"We were hoping to get going in the next couple of days but the moisture is still up there and we even had a skiff of rain this morning which won't help," he said on Tuesday.

Later in the week yet another low pressure system is expected to dump further rain on the region.

Mr Byron said the paddock of Phantom wheat had been knocked around by weather and was severely lodged but there appeared to be some yield and quality still left in the grain.

"There's a bit of black tip in it and obviously the test weight is a problem but before the most recent rain it was still making AGP quality, we'll see how much damage the last rain has done, but we'll still have a product we can sell even if it is only feed quality," Mr Byron said.

"It is very frustrating to be still harvesting at a time of year when you'd like to be doing things like organising gypsum and lime but the bottom line is that there is still a lot of value in the wheat still standing in the paddock and we're happy the quality has held on as well as it has."

"We'll hopefully get a run of hot and dry weather and then run over it really slowly and try and get as much in the header as possible and make the best of the situation."

Local agronomist Craig Drum said it had been a pain-staking harvest but good yields and a relative lack of quality issues given the amount of rain had been silver linings.

"It has been difficult for sure but many farmers have had good harvests and even for those who have been caught out the extent of the quality problems has not been quite as bad as it could have been given how much rain has fallen in some parts of the area," he said.

Scott Price, who also farms at Willaura, said he had just finished.

"It was a slow process and we got headers bogged trying to get going, so we're happy to have got it all done," he said.

Mr Byron said the wet start to the year raised concerns for the cropping season ahead.

Contrary to grain growers in most of Australia he said too much rain, not a deficit, was the problem.

"I'd love to see a good six week hot and dry spell here to dry things out, at present it is really wet and it would not take a lot of rain in the autumn to make it very wet when we wanted to start planting."